Do the Irish have, in relation to anybody else, any special capacity for the short story?'. Collecting short stories that cover many generations and moods of Irish writing, this title answers the question. It features the stories that range from Lady Gregory's retelling of an ancient love story through to the prolific William Trevor.
This volume presents the entire canon of Irish fiction in English, from Jonathan Swift (born 1667) to Emma Donoghue (born 1969). Selections from 100 renowned writers, including Oscar Wilde, James Joyce, Samuel Beckett, and others, are presented along with background information.
Ireland has always been a nation of story-tellers. This magnificent anthology chronicles the development of a rich literary tradition, from the earliest folk-tales to James Joyce, Liam O'Flaherty, and the rising stars of the new generation.
The Man Booker prize-winning author's selection of the best Irish short stories of the last sixty years, following Richard Ford's bestselling Granta Book of the American Short Story.
First written down in the eighth century AD, these early Irish stories depict a far older world - part myth, part legend and part history. Rich with magic and achingly beautiful, they speak of a land of heroic battles, intense love and warrior ideals, in which the otherworld is explored and men mingle freely with the gods. From the vivid adventures of the great Celtic hero Cu Chulaind, to the stunning 'Exile of the Sons of Uisliu' - a tale of treachery, honour and romance - these are masterpieces of passion and vitality, and form the foundation for the Irish literary tradition: a mythic legacy that was a powerful influence on the work of Yeats, Synge and Joyce.
Complete texts of "The Happy Prince and Other Tales," "A House of Pomegranates," "Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Other Stories," "Poems in Prose," and "The Portrait of Mr. W. H."
The Golden Age of the English short story lies from its first wide acceptance in the middle of the 19th century until the middle of the 20th. This book celebrates this period through some of the most widely known writers of the time.
"From the Bible through Dante and up to Treblinka and Guantánamo Bay, here is a rich source for nightmares." --The New York Times Book Review Three thousand years of visions of Hell, from the ancient Near East to modern America A Penguin Classic From the Hebrew Bible's shadowy realm of Sheol to twenty-first-century visions of Hell on earth, The Penguin Book of Hell takes us through three thousand years of eternal damnation. Along the way, you'll take a ferry ride with Aeneas to Hades, across the river Acheron; meet the Devil as imagined by a twelfth-century Irish monk--a monster with a thousand giant hands; wander the nine circles of Hell in Dante's Inferno, in which gluttons, liars, heretics, murderers, and hypocrites are made to endure crime-appropriate torture; and witness the debates that raged in Victorian England when new scientific advances cast doubt on the idea of an eternal hereafter. Drawing upon religious poetry, epics, theological treatises, stories of miracles, and accounts of saints' lives, this fascinating volume of hellscapes illuminates how Hell has long haunted us, in both life and death. For more than seventy-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 2,000 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
TELEGRAPH, INDEPENDENT, FINANCIAL TIMES AND OBSERVER BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2015 Hilarious, exuberant, subtle, tender, brutal, spectacular, and above all unexpected: these two extraordinary volumes contain the limitless possibilities of the British short story. This is the first anthology capacious enough to celebrate the full diversity and energy of its writers, subjects and tones. The most famous authors are here, and many others, including some magnificent stories never republished since their first appearance in magazines and periodicals. The Penguin Book of the British Short Story has a permanent authority, and will be reached for year in and year out. This volume takes the story from the 1920s to the present day. Edited and with an introduction by Philip Hensher, the award-winning novelist, critic and journalist.
The Penguin Book of Irish Poetry features the work of the greatest Irish poets, from the monks of the ancient monasteries to the Nobel laureates W.B. Yeats and Seamus Heaney, from Jonathan Swift and Oliver Goldsmith to Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin and Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, along with a profusion of lyrics, love poems, satires, ballads and songs. Reflecting Ireland's complex past and lively present, this collection of Irish verse is an indispensable guide to the history, culture and romance of one of Europe's oldest civilizations. In his introduction to this new Penguin Classics edition, Patrick Crotty explores the traditions of poetry in Ireland, and relates the rich variety of the poems to the long and frequently troubled history of the island.